


From the restaurant booth

by Rrayn



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Italian Mafia, Lobster, M/M, Other, Sold to One Direction, its harry styles luv
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-06
Updated: 2021-01-06
Packaged: 2021-03-17 09:54:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28598022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rrayn/pseuds/Rrayn
Summary: The story of a small crustacean stuck between the world of the mafia and the world of a rock star. Destined to be dead either way.
Relationships: Harry Styles/Original Male Character(s)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 2





	1. Sleeping with the Fishes

To enjoy life is to wake up with a smile on your face. To be happy at the mistakes you make, and to embrace the ups and downs life has to offer. I do not think I have lived a life I enjoyed, I have done nothing more but accept that life is not kind to everyone - especially not to lobsters. 

Everyday I try to remember my life before the tank, to the open waters. But when I close my eyes, all that comes to me is muddy waters, and a hard concrete floor. And the excruciating pain seeping through my claws. I was barely pink then, but the pain burned hot in my veins, hardening my shell and my heart. 

The tank is okay. Normally, when the boss isn’t too drunk to pay his bills, there are 50 of us. Crowding over each other, claws straining against the rubber bands. Newbies. Always thinking that there is a way out. They let out their aggression on each other, on themselves. But the inevitable always happens, some snot nosed beer bellied nobody picks his prize. And another lobster is gone. But never me. I'm too deformed, too small, too old. I have no idea why the boss still keeps me around. Maybe just to laugh at me.

He comes barging in, a sweat soaked wife beater over his swollen belly, shit stained boxers swallowing him whole. He kneels down to the tank, bellowing smoke out of his nose. He shoves his sausage finger against the glass. “You stupid fucking lobster, no one will ever love you, ever want your deformed body. I should just kill you right now.” 

I blink at him, I mean I am a lobster. What am I going to do? Tell him he's wrong. It does not matter, he's right anyways. I turn around, under the filter in my corner. I hide myself in the shadows. “Yeah go ahead and hide, but you won't be able to after today.” He threatens me with death, as if that isn’t what I wanted all along.


	2. The New Kid

“Bring them through the back! No workers through the front door!” He must be new, all the boss’s boys know that the feds watch the front door. None of the old boys would be so dumb. He’ll be dead by morning. Poor kid, I wonder how he got caught up in this mess. I also wonder what happened to the last boy. Promotion or fish food? Doesn’t matter, life in the digs is shit either way. You can never really leave. Me and the last fish boy had a lot in common. Before he would add the new lobsters to the tank, he would kick in a couple fish treats for me. “There ya go bud, me and you, we gotta stick together.” 

I got here around the same time he was hired. He picked me from the concrete basin. The fish farmer yelled, “I was gonna eat him myself, no ones gonna pay for him..if anything shove some coke in his shell. That's all he's good for. A fucking mule.”

The kid must have had some sympathy for me, taking me to what he thought would be a better life. The restaurant had just been taken over by new management, the last owner mysteriously disappearing after an incident with a wire. As the kid brought me in with the bucket of swarming crustacean the boss said to him, “You’re quiet, I like that. You'll do good. Keep ya head down, and talk to nobody. Expect for me of course. Let me grab the money for Frank.”

It only took me a week to realize that the restaurant was a front, and for the boss to realize I was no good. Every Thursday, it was just me, him, and Vinnie. Thursdays soon became my favorite days. Quite. Calm. Almost blissful.

It was a Thursday today, and the air was abnormally tense. Maybe it was the new kid, maybe it was the threat of my imminent death, maybe it was just that the restaurant had not seen a delivery in too long. The coke shipments were getting less and less each week, the restaurant lagging in the “family business.” 

When the bus showed up, every one grabbed their guns, stashed the coke. The new kid hid under a table. This is not what he signed up for, he only wanted to be a delivery boy. Make some extra cash, and then leave for college, with some amazing connections. But that's not just how it works, life is only a gift wrapped piece of shit. 

When the bell to the front door rang, the boss shouted, “were closed,” while keeping a tight hand on his Glock. We all held our breath, expecting either the feds or ‘upper management.’

But no fire was exchanged. Only five boys, and a manager. And a crystal clear voice, “Ah mate are you sure? Our bus broke down, and we are waiting for the tow truck?” Sensing the hesitation in the air, the manager stepped forward saying, “look bud, well buy the whole restaurant for the day, 7,500 pounds.” The boss didn’t speak British, but he understood money. This might save his life.   
“Fine, but do not expect no lobster, unless you want the deformed little grunt in the corner.”


	3. The Boys

The boys take a corner booth. Four of them laugh boisterously, exchanging inside jokes. They are rowdy, the kind of kid the boss hates. Normally, he would kick them out, yelling obscenities in Italian. But his pug face is sucking on a cigar, his nose turning red at the heat. His grubby hands count the cash, making neat little piles. The waiters, all young men, too quiet for their own good surround him. “Boys, you're all getting a raise. An extra dollar a week, thanks to our very own British invasion.” All the boys turn to the booth, raise their glasses sloshing with bear, and jeer, “THE BEATLES.”

This sends the booth into hysterics, the manager and the quiet one exchange glances and shake their heads. A drink is knocked over, and spills onto his pants. “OY!” They boys just laugh harder. “Awe did Harry pee his pants, poor baby.” 

“Fucking hell!” He leaves the table, throwing his napkin at their faces. The  
boys just laugh harder. He marches past my tank, swinging the door open to the bathroom. Stupid kids. A management, a band even, is just like the restaurant, the ‘family’, and the tank. They’re stuck, just like me, like the boss, and like the seafood delivery boy. No way out. At least - what is they called him, Harry? - at least he knows. He isn’t mad at his band, I bet he even loves them. He is mad at what they represent. Poor kid. 

He leaves the bathroom, tears playing at his eyes, and his sweater tied around his waist. He approaches my tank. “I told you kid, no good lobsters in there,” the boss says. Harry ignores him squatting down to my level, looking me in the eyes. His eyes are like green emeralds, and filled with so much pain. I know that him and I are the same. Trapped - different. Caged animals. 

He smiles at me, he knows it too. Something familiar stings my claws. Is there acid in this tank? Or is it just my beating heart?

“Oy! Harry! The bus is fixed, let's leave this hell hole.”


	4. Something Different

I can’t stop seeing his eyes. In my dreams, in strangers, even in the new kids eyes. They haunt me. Each vision a recurring sting of acid. I become like one of the newbies. I want out. 

The newbies are more suffocating than ever, climbing over each other. One, the red hulk as I have nicknamed him, manages to snap his rubber bands. He takes out three other lobsters trying to reach the top of the tank. I’m so numb to it all I don’t even care when he steps on my head to leave. I'm just grateful he doesn’t go for my neck. The boss enters just as his head leaves the water. “AYE! New kid! Get in here!” 

The red hulks death is quick, the new kid grabs him, dropping him on the floor. His steel toed boot crushes in his skull. No one tries to leave after that. The special of the day is gumbo, with lobster bits. The red hulk and the killed lobsters stewed with rabbit meat. No one orders it, and by the next Thursday, the boss's boys are eating it for lunch. 

Vinnie, the cockroach, sits on the other side of the tank. I didn’t see him last week, too much commotion. I do not like Vinnie, as much as I do tolerate him. He only likes me because he claims we are cousins. “You and I bud, we are crustaceans. We gots to stick together. Plus the boss doesn't want you as much as he wants me.” He is wrong about that one, the boss would kill him on site, even fumigate the whole restaurant. That's a type of mercy, the boss hates me though. Enough to keep me around just to taunt me with empty threats.

“Ya know, you’re different today.” This catches my attention, I normally can manage a few nods, maybe some blinks towards Vinnie, then he leaves. But he is right, I am different. I say the first thing that I ever have to him, “I am different.”

“Oh ho ho, he speaks! A miracle! I was starting to think that that acid spill got to your head, made you stupid. See I am always right, you would have never let that shit go down that did. Waste of life. Waste of meat. I bet that gumbo will be in the trash by tonight, can’t wait to chow down on that. But i will avoid your brothers of course, outta respect…” He rambles on for a few more minutes, till he remembers my existence. “You changed huh?”

“Yeah, I met someone.”


End file.
